Alan, the Champion — Chapter 3 — Cannon Fodder
There is always an opening for a child in crime. Alan takes the first one offered.
Before he was King, he was cannon fodder, a convict, a killer. At thirteen, he ran grown men.
There's one place in the world that always has an opening for a kid.
Think it through with me. A kid doesn't have a work card. Doesn't have an ID worth a damn. Can't be hired, can't sign anything, doesn't exist on paper. No honest job employs somebody who doesn't exist.
But crime does.
Crime doesn't ask for papers. Doesn't ask your age. Crime hugs you, feeds you, teaches you a trade and even calls you family. When you've got nobody left, it's the only thing in the world that opens the door and says come on in.
I came in at four, more or less. No way to know for sure.
The ones running my piece of Marélia were the Banca.
The Banca is what we call the people who run the Hill — who decides the price, who decides the turf, who decides who lives and who disappears. Above the street you've got the dealer, who sells. Above the dealer you've got the manager, who answers for a drug spot. Above the manager you've got the front man, who answers for a whole neighborhood. And way up there, at the top of the Hill, you've got the council, who answers only to itself.
The one who pulled me in was a woman everybody called Auntie. She rounded up the loose kids, gave them soup, gave them a mattress, and after a few weeks gave them a job. Simple. Carry a sealed package to an address and come back. Whoever came back with the package delivered and his mouth shut got more soup and a bigger job. Whoever opened the package, or talked too much, dropped out of the line and Auntie never remembered his name again.
That was HR. I only figured that out years later.
I started at the bottom of everything. Ran messages from one spot to another. Watched the corner and whistled when the cop car turned in. Kid stuff. Nobody trusts a five-year-old with money or dope, but everybody trusts a pair of eyes.
In time I climbed a step. I went out on the street with the grown-ups.